Simeon Solomon’s Night (1890) turns darkness into a face you almost recognise. This oil work is often read as Nyx, the Greek personification of night, shown in profile with closed eyes, shadowed flowers and a mood of velvet melancholy. The figure is allegorical, not a known lover or sitter, but the softness is deeply coded. Solomon, a Jewish Pre-Raphaelite artist later punished for homosexual acts, often used myth and androgyny as cover for forbidden feeling. Here, night becomes refuge: beautiful, secretive and quietly awake.
